The Educated Marketer

Why Your Website Isn’t Relevant

Most Colleges and Universities have a website and online presence, but if their website isn’t usable and their content isn’t useful, websites that are designed to be helpful are defeating their purpose. Read on to find out how you can make your website relevant.

According to a 2014 Uversity Report, 97% of students have visited the website of a college they are interested in but nearly 2/3 of those students found that the experience was “just ok” or “challenging.” In addition to have trouble actually accessing the sites, only 4 in 10 students found the information and content on the college’s website to be relevant.

So what are you doing wrong?

Your website won’t load on a mobile device

Teenagers are on their smart phones constantly. If they can’t access an easy-to-use site on their phones, they won’t stick around. In fact, according to HuffPo, research shows that if your website doesn’t load within 3 seconds, you lose 57% of your mobile visitors.

Your content is too long and complicated

Mobile users crave convenience. They are after all, mobile. If they can’t download your website they are leaving. If they download content that will take too long to read, they are leaving. Simplify everything. Make it short and easy to read.

Your content is just bad

Maybe you aren’t focusing on delivering content that interests your prospective students, or maybe it’s just badly written. You need to know who is viewing your website, and you need writers who can deliver great content. No shortcuts here.

You are too focused on SEO

There can definitely be too much of a good thing. If you are using the same keywords and phrases over and over again, the search engines will find you, but no one will stick around to actually read what you have to say. Use keyword best practices, but lay off enough to have a genuine voice.

Take a step back and really look at your website as if you are a prospective student seeing it for the first time. Does it load quickly? Is it up to date? Is the content interesting? Would you stick around to read it?